Official cleared in PTSD inquiry

Wednesday

Aug 1, 2012 at 12:01 AM

By PAULINE JELINEK and LOLITA C. BALDOR Associated Press

The Army has reinstated the head of a West Coast medical center and changed its screening system after an investigation into whether officials reversed soldiers' post-traumatic stress diagnoses to save money, senior leaders announced Tuesday.

The review found that Col. Dallas Homas, commander at Madigan Army Medical Center in Washington state, "did not inappropriately influence PTSD diagnoses" but that the system being used to diagnose soldiers was inappropriate for the military.

Problems with the system at Madigan, which is at Joint Base Lewis-McChord near Tacoma, came to light when officials reversed some of the soldiers' initial diagnoses of PTSD during additional evaluations. The reversals raised questions about whether the changes were being made to save money.

As a result, Army leaders in May launched a sweeping review of how the service evaluates soldiers for mental health problems at all its facilities. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta later ordered a similar review across all branches of the armed services. Those larger reviews continue.

Part of the focus of the investigation at Madigan was a forensic psychiatric team that had the lead role in screening soldiers being considered for medical retirement and benefits due to PTSD, a condition that results from experiencing or seeing a traumatic event, such as a battlefield casualty or the brutal rigors of war.

Of the 2.6 million soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines that have deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan, it's estimated that 13 percent to 20 percent have symptoms of PTSD.